Now, many of these countries are small African or Caribbean countries that have only won one or two medals in their entire history.

But there are also a handful of countries that have won dozens of medals over the years but never in the Winter Olympics, such as Cuba (194), Greece (108), Brazil (91), Turkey (82) and Kenya (75). Here’s a chart I made up in Tableau Public, showing the top Summer-only medal winners:

Now, as you go down the list of countries that have only won Summer medals they are, for the most part, the ones you’d expect: Countries with hot climates where it rarely, if ever, snows.

But there are also a few surprises on the list, too. Like Iceland, which has won four medals at the Summer Olympics but not a single Winter medal. Now, Iceland could be a fluke. It’s a small country (only about 300,000 residents) and with only four medals it could just be chance that they’re all in the Summer Games.

The bigger surprise, in my view, is Denmark. A nation of 5 million people with a long, shared history with Winter-Olympic-powerhouses Norway and Sweden. Yet in the history of the modern Olympics, Denmark has won 170 medals at the Summer Olympics and only one — yes one — at the Winter Olympics (a silver in curling in 1998).

I’ve been to Denmark once and my wife’s family is Danish. So I know its climate is more wet than snowy in winter. And it’s also a pretty flat country, so its residents have few chances to downhill ski.

But still. The Netherlands is a pretty flat, temperate country, too and it’s won 86 medals at the Winter Olympics (26% of its total haul), mostly in speed skating.

Even Australia has won nine medals at the Winter Olympics.

What’s up, Denmark?

I’m genuinely curious about what might explain how a Scandinavian country can do so poorly at winter sports. If any Danes or Danish-Canadians are reading this and have a theory, please post a comment or send me a note on Twitter.

And if you’d like to explore the data yourself, check out my interactive graphic on Tableau Public. It loads up the top winter countries by default but you can switch to the summer table by just clicking the tab at the top of your screen.